Marketers told – don’t get into social media just because it’s fashionable
Using social media in a marketing campaign is becoming a “lazy” choice for marketers attracted by lower media costs and agencies who want to follow the cool kids, a debate heard today.
Michael McShane, managing director of drinks house Brown-Forman which includes brands such as Jack Daniel’s and Southern Comfort – told the Australian Marketing Institute debate: “People tend to get a bit lazy. They come up with these new media options as a way of saving money rather than as the right answer to a problem.”
He later added: “In this environment, as spend is contracting, one of the things I do see coming through is a focus on the numbers rather than the strategy. They start answering the question you haven’t even asked.”
Adam Ballesty, marketing manager of sportswear brand Skins, had a similar view. He said: “A lot of marketers are saying ‘We’ve got to get on Facebook’ . But who cares? Marketers are not thinking about the brand strategy. Don’t just do it because all the cool kids are doing it.
“Digital is bloody hard. Brands get a Facebook page and start Twittering and get a thousand followers, but what does it mean? You need to have a message the consumers want to hear. Digital marketing is is one thing where you can make some big mistakes expensively.”
Jon Bird, CEO of retail agency Ideaworks, said: “There is a lot of focus on new media, but you have got to start by getting your strategy and message right first.”
And Shaun Branagan, ECD of AdPartners, added: “Watch out for your agencies – everyone wants to follow the fashion.” He also warned there was a risk that consumers were become tired of similar online campaigns. He said: “People just switch off.”
And although it’s possible to be carried away by the takeup of new services such as Twitter, it’s also important to remember that many consumers are not involved, said Branagh. “There are the massive passives and the cool kids,” he said
Naked Communications’ Adam Ferrier said that while accelerating media fragmentation offered a major challenge, it also offered a new opportunities. He said: “I think it creates an opportunity to be much more targeted with your communications and have a molecular model of brand building. You are building up communication plans by pods of communication.” He cited the example of Nike, that talks to individual communities such as runners.
Tim Burrowes founded Mumbrella in 2008. He worked on Mumbrella until 2021. At various points he was editor, content director and editor-at-large.
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Very nice summary Tim.
: )
(And OMG that was quick!)
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Outside of the news media, the most successfull ongoing corporate twitter accounts in Australia belong to Billabong and ColesCard. Using a measure that is “no. of followers’.
Of course there are a number of other success metrics for using a twitter like social media, such as – brand engagement, reach, advocacy, even doing market research. But they can also be measured in terms of ‘servicing’ costs, such as mitigating inbound complaints management, call handling, by providing a wisdom of crowds servicing capability.
The extension of such capability cuts across multiple functions of a business which makes it difficult for th agencies to recommend, or for that matter control. Twitter is about facilitating and participating, its not about broadcasting and positioning…these are just consequences of innovating for customers in a new channel.
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Sounds like the agencies are concerned that social marketing = lower spends with them.
Agree with some of the points (there is a right way to do it), but likewise why would you suggest ignoring your target audience in the places they are increasingly turning to over older forms of media? Social/ online should always be in the mix now, and the consumption stats prove that.
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Where is anyone saying anything around clients/agencies ignoring their target audience Duncan?
Sounds to me all they are saying is maybe there’s scope to be a bit more diligent when evaluating this area of comms … which is probably true.
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Sorry Duncan, I disagree – just because certain audiences (and I emphasise the “certain”) are consuming social media/online doesn’t mean that this is where they want to have companies communicating with them.
Social media is just that – social.
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I see social media as another marketing channel. It needs to fit in with overrall marketing and brand management strategy.
Also, social media isn’t appropriate for all brands/products either. i agree with some of the comments expressed above about “cool kids” – there’s a lot of consumers/potential target market that are NOT using social media. So u have to make sure you have marketing invested into print, tv, radio, etc… as well
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accelerating fragmentation leading to molecular pods of communications?
i like your point… but what a bullshit artist.
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Starting with the tools is always a bad idea. Measuring only on eyeballs is not the way to go. Start by learning and listening. Ask your most passionate users how they feel about you. What else do they want and where are they spending their time online. Do a SWAT analysis of your brand online. Your profile, competitors, industry trends etc. What is your biggest business problem, which tools can solve it and how? come up with an annual online strategy that fits your overall marketing strategy. Here’s the most important thing to remember: Earned media (or “social media”) is like customer service. You should do it all the time, put resources behind it and not think about it as you think about sales or campaigns. One more thing, 14 year old people don’t call this thing: “social media”. It’s just life. If today’s brands want to be relevant to this target audience in a few years they need to start understanding the space now.
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Hi Tim…
Sounds like it would have been an interesting debate.
In terms of Mr McShanes comment; “People tend to get a bit lazy. They come up with these new media options as a way of saving money rather than as the right answer to a problem.” – I’d have to say that I probably partially agree.
There are heaps of digital/social marketing professionals worldwide (including myself) that will argue that many marketers/agencies are probably going about implementing social strategy the wrong way. From what I can take from your summary above, this seems to be the flavour of the discussion at the AMI debate today.
I think what many marketers/agencies tend to do is pick the social ‘technologies’ first – ie like the Facebook fan pages or the Twitter feeds – instead of focusing on what they actually want their social strategy to accomplish or achieve.
Forrester Inc. wrote a bloody fantastic whitepaper back in Sept/Oct 2007 on the value of understanding ‘social profiles’, then setting measurable ‘social objectives’ and then – and only then – implementing well thought out ‘social strategies’ before the actual ‘social technologies’ are actually deployed.
Given that social media is still relatively (and is the flavour of the moment) many marketers or clients assume that setting up a Facebook fan page, a MySpace page or a Twitter profile allows them to tick the “social media box” on the marketing plan. But any communications delivery without a well thought out stratetgy (online or offline) will fail (der!) because there was no defined objective, or the attempt was not suited to the actual social needs of customers or audiences.
In addition, I think many people hear the words “Social Media” and automatically think Facebook/Myspace/Twitter. Whereas ‘social media’ when used correctly (and as part of a well thought out social strategic approach) will use technologies like forums, wiki’s, social sites, widgets, user-generated-content, community-generated-content, online- video-channels, IPTV, podcasting, social gaming, blogs/micro-blogs, mobile apps, email marketing, reviews & opinion sites, IM (instant messaging), picture-sharing, wall-postings, music-sharing, virtual reality, social-content-aggregation… god, the list is almost bloody endless! And the line is very blurry!
There is a massive opportunity and place for social media strategy, but like any other communications channel (again, offline or online) – it (social) needs to part of a well planned, strategic integrated marketing approach.
If you want to read the Forrester whitepaper let me know and I’ll see if I can dig it out the name of it as I think you can buy it online. It was really, really good.
So thats my two cents!
Cheers Tim and hope you’re well.
Sime
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Many of us had a different thoughts and beliefs through social media agency as far as i know they are those people who help the other company to made their work easy and i love your articles regarding that social media and their post too.
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the new vs old media debate is just like the (now old) ATL vs BTL debate, and one of the panelists today lamented we still use the latter nomenclature. my view is that we practitioners need to be on top of what ALL the various tools can do, and apply them when relevant to a particular client need.
cheap doesn’t mean good, look no further than spam to see the usefulness of free email executed badly.
clients that sit down in briefings asking agencies to deliver viral for example are as bad as the self-interested peddlers of the latest new thing.
the best new media/marketing tools in the world are of no use if you don’t have an engaging and relevant idea.
i suppose while we have an industry that is increasingly fragmented (just like our consumer markets) with various specialists who have only their narrow area to push then this debate will be with us indefinitely, creating a heap of confused clients and a bunch of poorly thought through campaigns
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As a medium, so-called “social” media can come with great risks. As a 22yr old myself who interacts exclusively in social media, to put out a social media campaign that doesnt interact with its intended target in a new and different way makes a brand the object of ridicule. This has happened previously with Sony’s graffiti campaigns, the psp rap and many other half hearted attempts at relating to the youth culture.
Youth culture is as insular as it is because it is exactly that…. youth. Any effort to target this market must not be seen to talk down or patronise or risk negative effects that far outweigh the potential benefits. A upcoming brand must seriously consider the risks when moving into the social media arena.
On the other hand, i have a suprisingly large amount of friends and contacts who are memebers of hte youth culture and do NOT engage in social media activities such as facebook and myspace. These tools are increasingly becoming blase, with twitter comments becoming more and more inane and facebook becoming cluttered and impersonal. Mass media can still be effective in reaching a younger audience if it is focused, well thought out and appeals to this disenfranchised group.
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Like any other channel, do your research, listen to conversations, who is saying what and where, are they influential, are their affinity groups; then armed with that information, you can then make strategic engagement decisions. But only then. Diving into blind tactics is the knee-jerk reaction, but any decent consultancy ‘should’ be advising against that. Do your homework first.
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Tom Dodson (comment 12) makes a good point.
Most Brands are just not cool, no matter how much we wish they were.
Careless social networking campaigns can actually damage a brand’s image.
Do we want our brand to look like the sleazy forty year old at the schoolies event?
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surely the point is that businesses should have social media strategies in addition to their traditional strategies? Social media fulfills different needs, achieves different goals, to traditional marketing….I don’t think anyone would see social media as a replacement, would they?
a lot of the points make sense though – get your strategy right and use the appropriate media (digital or otherwise) to fit the strategy, not the other way around.
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Brands and businesses using “social” media, need to remember their place in our lives. True they want to be our friends and connect with us, but they forget RELEVANCE and to consider if we actually want them to be socializing with us.
Nike is a good example of someone who gets it and is invited into social networks by communities of interest.
Many brands try to muscle in on the social networking conversations thinking there is a commercial return. This results in resentment – a bit like the bore at a party.
As is normal in any new media, a dramatic lack of insight into who uses it and how they use it, often results in clumsy brand interference.
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Get a life. Please go outside and play. Just get a fucking life.
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A lot of you people need to realize that most of these sites are a good pass time and if you can get a bit out of it then its a win.
My companies Twitter page: twitter.com/macbethaust hosts treasure hunts all around the country via twitter and the people who follow us love it. Gets the followers hyped and keen to find our products hidden around the place, when they do they brag about it and also have great time doing so. After its all done we have directly hit our audience we wanted to and makes more people to want to be apart of it.
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There is laziness in Social Media but Social Media is not a lazy option. The laziness is to be found in most “traditional” agencies and in media buying agencies in particular. They are looking for the “tick the box” solution for social media without ever taking the time to understand the nature and mechanics of this complex and powerful dialogue with their client’s customers. I think every client wants a two way dialogue with their customers but few are ready for the challenges that this brings to their business and their agencies. A “viral” or a FaceBook page is not social media by any standard.
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